In which Our Hero Oscillates
A note I jotted yesterday:
One reason I like New York:
- Tomorrow I plan to swing by the Manhattan Department of Buildings for their walk-in office hours. They’re open from 4-7pm at 280 Broadway. I will ask them about ADA accessibility and exceptions.
- There exist only two induction cooktops with knobs and downdrafts. One is massive and ugly and only ships to the EU. The other has three showrooms in New York City, one of which is at… 280 Broadway!
Not only did a question occur to me today, and tomorrow I get it answered. But a second question occurred to me (“what’s the cooktop like?”) and I get to answer that, too! At the same address.
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Today’s follow-up:
Goddamnit, why won’t you let me make my own bathroom the way I want?
Don’t tell me that I want an ADA-compliant bathroom.
Don’t tell me that one day I might want one.
Don’t paternalize me about my own preferences of how I want to organize my own fucking home.
This isn’t about wet over dry.
This has no impact on anyone else’s safety.
Even if I had a child who ended up in a wheelchair, I wouldn’t want an ADA-compliant bathroom. ADA compliance requires 32” doors. A child-size wheelchair is 22.5in wide. Adult wheelchairs max out at 26” wide. I want to build one bathroom with a 28”-wide door. If I need grab handles, I will install them later. This is not a commercial establishment. This is my own home. If I want a 7’ long by 3’ wide bathtub, you should let me do that in my own goddamn space, not force me to have a 5’ long tub in order to allow for wheelchair rotation clearance. The bathroom is only 40 square feet, and you want to dedicate 10% of it to some theoretical future person who can’t even fit in my front door?
“What’s that,” you ask? “Why won’t they be entering the front door?”
My concrete-surrounded front door is only 27” wide. (29” with the door removed). Last I checked, 27” is narrower than 32”. It’s even narrower than 29”, and that’s assuming you want the handicapped visitor to remove the door and reattach it every time they enter. Why would you want to do that to them? Talk about inaccessible!
This is why people vote small government.
Julian Wise 